Weis wants Patriots' view on what he's done wrong

After a season in which very little has gone right, Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis will consult with a team for which almost nothing has gone wrong.

Weis confirmed Sunday he would solicit off-season suggestions and criticism from the New England Patriots, his previous employer and current powerhouse of the NFL.

"I think I've probably made several mistakes this year," Weis said. "The ones who know my system the best are New England, and I think those guys would have no problem telling me what things I did right and what things I did wrong.

"Sometimes you go to different coaches for some help, and they don't want to tell you what you did wrong. But I want to know, hey, what would you have done different?

"Those people [in New England], because we're close enough, won't be afraid of saying to me, 'What the heck are you doing?' And that's what I want."

Broad view

Weis said a wholesale re-evaluation will begin on Dec. 17, when he finishes recruiting.

"Once I've identified what the problems are, then you can go about fixing them," Weis said. "Some of them can be schematic. Some of them will be X's and O's, and some of them might be methodologies of teaching. We have to find out what they are before we can move forward."

Z factor

For the record, the offense quarterbacked by Tom Zbikowski was an actual emergency package installed during the Irish's week off, with Jimmy Clausen banged up and unproven Darrin Bragg and Justin Gillett backing up Evan Sharpley.

"We needed to have something you could turn to if the regular offense wasn't getting you anything," Weis said. "We called it the 'Zibby 10-pack.' He kind of liked that."